WL Plastics replaced a QuickBooks system it had long outgrown with Business ByDesign, SAP’s on-demand ERP suite, and despite EDI and reporting problems, the company is pleased, explained CFO Neil Briggs.

The chancellor George Osborne has described the VAT rise as a permanent structural tax countering those hopes that, given the ongoing tough economic environment, the government might reconsider the changes introduced today. VAT has risen by 2.5% to 20%, the highest level it has ever been, as of midn

Alongside well-known names such as singerAnnie Lennox and actor Bert Kwuok, the IT sector was handed a few gongs in the 2011 New Year Honours list. Among the 900 recipients lining up outside Buckingham Palace will be the chairman of outsourcing and IT services provider Genisys Group, Ashok Rabheru,

Dell has extended its security service with the acquisition of SecureWorks. SecureWorks provides IT security services including managed security services, security and risk consulting services and threat intelligence. Dell said the acquisition extends its global IT-as-a-service offerings and information security expertise.

Acquisitive networking and comms provider Daisy Group has formally rebranded its distribution units, Anglia Telecom and Fone Logistics, as Daisy Distributionfollowing a lengthy integration process. The unit, which be run out of the former Anglia Telecomoffice in Suffolk, will maintainFone Logistics'

Cloud is being tipped as one of the major growth areas this year as vendors try to place their bets of where the growth in the channel will be coming from. With 2011 likely to remain a tough trading environment the prospects of sales around cloud will be welcomed by resellers looking for a way of dr

Keeping netyworks ticking over and maintaining uptime and availability will remain the biggest concerns for corporate customers during 2011, according to research conducted on behalf of Ipswitch's Network Management Division. A survey of 100,000 customers found that a quarter of repondents said main

The new year is just a few days old but already the acquisitions have begun, with Dell announcing plans to buy SecureWorks. The Texas-based PC giant spent $876m buying Compellent Technologies last month and is looking to follow that up with a purchase that will bolster its security credentials. The

David Clarke, CEO of the chartered institute of computing the BCS, talks to Computer Weekly about being awarded an MBE, the future of the IT profession and tackling a membership revolt against his leadership last year.

Business internet services provider Griffin has sold off the VoIP assets that it acquired when it bought Fused Group last October. Griffinrescued DSL and leased line specialist Fused from administration in a pre-pack deal, but its hosted VoIP business was very much a sideline and according tomanagin

With almost 100 tablets expected to be launched at this year's International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, 2011 is set to be the year of the tablet device. Computer Weekly rounds up the latest tablet announcements from CES 2011.

The Consumer Electronics Show (CES), the annual consumer technology shindig in Las Vegas is set to be dominated by tablets. The show will be used as a platform to launch around 80 tablets with Toshiba one of the larger names joining the ranks of Apple and Samsung which have already released product

McAfee has appointed former Juniper channel sales boss David Small to run its channel and commercial business in EMEA, after previous incumbentGeorges Millet left to pursue other opportunities. Small joins just months after McAfee nabbed Juniper's Gert-Jan Schenk as its new EMEA president. "Dav

Among all of the predictions about the growth of cloud computing this year are expectations that the technology will become more widely adopted by SMEs. The move towards cloud by the channel heartland is being tipped as one of the main features of the 12 months ahead as smaller firms look to exploi

Cloud provider Virtustream is turning to the channel to spearhead its next growth phase in the mid-market. The privately held firm, which launched as a virtualisation specialist a decade ago, has acquired numerous businesses and developed data centres on both sides of the Atlantic, backed up with i

Channel veteran Mark Nutt has returned to the vendor fold after joining security firm Symantec to drive sales and strategy across the EMEA region. Nutt pitched up at Morse in the summer of 2001 as a divisional head having worked at HP for 13 years. During the subsequent decade he held various direc

Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer highlighted that the next version of Windows will be the first to run on ARM processors in his keynote address at the opening of the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) has found the Scottish Court Service in breach of the Data Protection Act for failing to prevent court documents containing personal data being accidentally disposed of at a local recycling bank in Glasgow.

Commsvendor snom is to launch a Certified Engineer programme targeting resellers seeking entry to theIP telephony market,having successfully trialled a similar scheme in Italy. The Germany-basedvendor, which claims to havebeen inundated with requests for information on how best to approach theIP mar

Merchants are still failing to understand the requirements of PCI DSS credit card data protection or the consequences of failing to be compliant with the rules. The largest merchants had to meet a raft of PCI requirements by the end of last September before the standard to protect data is rolled out

Global IT spending in 2011 hinges upon a beneficial US dollar exchange rate but comms kit, computing hardware and enterprise software represent the strongest growth prospects for the industry, according to Gartner. The numbers are still being crunched but the market watcher reckons the amount doled

Spending on business intelligence will be driven more through the channel and away from vendors over the next three years. The prediction of 40% of trading on business analytics to go through integrators rather than vendors by 2014 has been made by Gartner which has identified the latest market tre

Hamilton Rentals, a specialist in demo equipment and short-term rents of hardware, has been acquired by US outfit Xchange Technology Group. Hamilton, which is an Oracle and Microsoft gold partner has been acquired in an all-share purchase to provide a UK arm for Xchange which has been running a sim

SAP's global senior vice president of indirect sales, Pat Hume, has left the company for undisclosed reasons. In a statement sent to MicroScope, SAP confirmed Hume's departure and said her role will be taken over by SAP senior vice president of volume resellers and service providers,Fritz Neumeyer.

Computer 2000's efforts to find a permanent general manager for its PC division received a minor set back over the festive period as Phil Brown, who was expected to take the role, decided to join Micro P. Late last year, MicroScope revealed that Brown, sales director at ASUS, looked set to return to

The consolidation that has been a feature of the recession could provide headaches for those trying to keep an eye on software licences. With software audits on the rise and the financial risks involved with being caught highlighted regularly with large settlements with the Business Software Allian

Industry veteran Joe McNally has been awarded the Commander of the Victorian Order (CVO) in recognition of two decade's service helping youngsters develop through the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme. McNally entered the IT sector as a programmer with ICL, then moved to Honeywell as a salesman before